Moments to Relive

A week before the High School State Softball Playoffs, my team had tied for first place with two other teams. A coin was flipped to decide the seeding for the state playoffs; and, we lucked out with the third seed. So as you can see we weren’t feeling too good about ourselves and about our three-way tie. Even though we didn’t know at the time our opponent, we were all hoping that our first game wasn’t going to be as hard as our coach was telling us it was going to be. I had been to the state playoffs with some of the girls twice before, but the nerves and the fear of losing got to me every time as we loaded the bus for our first game. I guess at the time I wouldn’t have said I was scared, but now I can admit that I was scared enough to pee the shorts I was wearing. These moments though are something that I yearn for everyday, and just to go back and relive them would be something of a dream come true to me. I believe that everyone as a moment in their life that they love and wish they could relive.

I surely wouldn’t like to experience the close call of peeing my shorts, but the moments being on the bus with my team, in the dugout, and on the field are the moments I would relive. On the bus ride there you could tell we were all daydreaming about ourselves making great catches and hitting the ball to the right spot to get on base. As I sat by my best friend I told her that I felt like I was going to die because I was so nervous. She laughed and said, “Then who was going to play right field if you’re on the ground dead?” Although nervous, the laughter we shared meant I certainly didn’t feel alone. These girls were like my sisters and I knew that they always had my back in good times and in the bad. Our joking around and teasing each other about things we did in the past always brought us closer together. Our nerves seemed to vanish when we were together cracking jokes and making fools of ourselves.

We got off the bus looking a little confused as to what field we were playing on first. As we waited for instructions, Coach Squire made funny comments to get us to loosen up. “I hope everyone here is wearing their lucky underwear today. I know I am!” our coach joked as we stood around waiting. I guess I was wearing my lucky underwear that day since there was no peeing of the shorts fiasco. If there was one thing I loved about my softball team it was how much we laughed together. It always helped us play better and remember to have fun out on the field. Reliving this moment reminds me to have fun hurdling life’s obstacles.

Out of all the moments that I would like to relive I even would want to relive my own stupidity. The team we played our first game that day was a team that we had played before and lost to. So it was hard not to stare at them as they were warming up. I caught myself a couple of times gawking at them, but quickly looking away so that I could get focused. I sensed from the demeanor they thought they were going to beat us just because they had defeated us once before. I still wonder to this day what we looked like to them as we warmed up. Did we look cocky or scared out of our minds? When it was time to start the game, I ran in the dugout to put on sunscreen before heading out to the field. While applying my sunscreen, Coach Squire yelled to me to remember to always put some additional sunscreen on every 15 minutes. This joke was her way of reminding me of how much of an idiot I was when I was a junior. I once told her that SPF 15 meant to put on sunscreen every 15 minutes. So after her little joke I blushed and said I wouldn’t forget to.

I could end this story by giving you a play by play on how we took second place at state, but I prefer to tell you that winning could never replace the great moments my team and I had together. Every little joke and humiliating thing we did together leading up to the state playoffs are the moments I would love to relive. Also the moments of tears and laughter are irreplaceable in my mind. I believe these types of moments from our past inspire us to create future moments of inspiration. So if I could go back and bottle the time I spent with my softball team, especially the moment after we took second place at state as we stood together with our arms around each other for a picture, this I believe could inspire great things in all of us.

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Growing up in the former Yugoslavia, lawyer Djenita Pasic enjoyed the peace of her religiously diverse country. But after the fall of communism and the outbreak of the Bosnian War, Pasic was forced to reevaluate her ideas about religion and tolerance. Click here to read her essay.